Power

Disney+ reaches 86.8 million paying subscribers and the price will go up in March

Disney is still committed to theatrical release windows, but execs signaled that could change.

Disney+ reaches 86.8 million paying subscribers and the price will go up in March

Star will be available as part of Disney+ in Western Europe, Canada and New Zealand starting in February.

Image: Disney

Disney's streaming service continues to grow at a rapid pace: The streaming service now has 86.8 million paying subscribers, Disney CEO Bob Chapek announced at the company's annual investor day on Thursday. Disney also announced a new Star-branded streaming service that is being integrated into Disney+ in some territories, and a slight price increase: Disney+ will cost $7.99, up from $6.99, starting next March. Pricing in other territories will also increase.

Star will be available as part of Disney+ in Western Europe, Canada and New Zealand starting in February. Star will offer a number of Disney shows and movies currently available to U.S. audiences on Hulu; consumers will have to unlock the content because it includes R-rated titles and other content that stands out from the family-friendly Disney+ fare.

Star won't be part of Disney+ everywhere: The company will be making a standalone Star+ service available in Latin America. Disney is adopting the brand from India, where it acquired Hotstar last year, and used it as a key driver for Disney+ adoption. One-third of all Disney+ subscribers are currently located in India, said Disney International DTC Chairman Rebecca Campbell: "Our launches around the world have been a key factor to subscriber growth to date."

Disney executives also used the event to give investors an update on the company's other streaming services. Hulu now has 38.8 million subscribers, including 4 million who pay for the company's live TV service. ESPN+ reached 11.5 million subscribers by early December.

This puts Disney years ahead of its own forecasts for its direct-to-consumer businesses. When Disney first announced plans to launch Disney+, the company predicted that it would reach between 60 million and 90 million subscribers by 2024. The company had planned to reach 40 million to 60 million subscribers for Hulu by 2024, as well as 8 million to 12 million for ESPN+. On Thursday, Disney updated its Disney+ guidance; the company is now expecting the service to have 230 million to 260 million subscribers by 2024.

The latest number drop also means that Disney+ added more than 13 million subscribers over the past two months. Disney executives revealed last month that the service had reached 73.7 million subscribers on Oct. 3, which marked the end of its fiscal fourth quarter.

Disney executives said Thursday that the company was prioritizing its streaming services over other areas of its business going forward. As part of this strategy, Disney committed to the release of a number of original Marvel, "Star Wars" and Disney/Pixar series exclusively on Disney+ over the coming years. In addition, Disney will release 15 live action and animated Disney and Pixar feature films on the service.

However, Disney stopped short of a day-and-date movie release strategy like the one Warner Bros. plans to implement in 2021. WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar announced last week that the studio would be releasing all of its movies on HBO Max on the day of their theater premiere — an announcement that caught theater chains like AMC by surprise.

Disney, on the other hand, is still nominally committed to the theatrical window, with some exceptions; the company will release the live-action movie "Raya and the Last Dragon" as a paid premium title on Disney+ when it reaches theaters next March, much like it did with "Mulan" last summer.

Disney media and entertainment distribution chairman Kareem Daniel signaled that the company could adopt similar models for other titles down the road. The company had the ability to "quickly reevaluate" its release strategy, Daniel said, adding that it would ultimately do what was best for consumers.

Update: This article was updated at 5:30 p.m. PT to include more information about guidance and pricing.

Janko Roettgers

Janko Roettgers (Twitter, Mastodon) used to be a senior reporter at Protocol, reporting on the shifting power dynamics between tech, media, and entertainment, including the impact of new technologies. Previously, Janko was Variety's first-ever technology writer in San Francisco, where he covered big tech and emerging technologies. He has reported for Gigaom, Frankfurter Rundschau, Berliner Zeitung, and ORF, among others. He has written three books on consumer cord-cutting and online music and co-edited an anthology on internet subcultures. He lives with his family in Oakland.

disney streaming hulu star
Fintech

Judge Zia Faruqui is trying to teach you crypto, one ‘SNL’ reference at a time

His decisions on major cryptocurrency cases have quoted "The Big Lebowski," "SNL," and "Dr. Strangelove." That’s because he wants you — yes, you — to read them.

The ways Zia Faruqui (right) has weighed on cases that have come before him can give lawyers clues as to what legal frameworks will pass muster.

Photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

“Cryptocurrency and related software analytics tools are ‘The wave of the future, Dude. One hundred percent electronic.’”

That’s not a quote from "The Big Lebowski" — at least, not directly. It’s a quote from a Washington, D.C., district court memorandum opinion on the role cryptocurrency analytics tools can play in government investigations. The author is Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.

Keep Reading Show less
Veronica Irwin

Veronica Irwin (@vronirwin) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol covering fintech. Previously she was at the San Francisco Examiner, covering tech from a hyper-local angle. Before that, her byline was featured in SF Weekly, The Nation, Techworker, Ms. Magazine and The Frisc.

cryptocurrency blockchain bitcoin lawsuit
sponsored content
Sponsored Content

How is technological innovation breaking down barriers and increasing access to financial services?

The financial technology transformation is driving competition, creating consumer choice, and shaping the future of finance. Hear from seven fintech leaders who are reshaping the future of finance, and join the inaugural Financial Technology Association Fintech Summit to learn more.

Keep Reading Show less
FTA
The Financial Technology Association (FTA) represents industry leaders shaping the future of finance. We champion the power of technology-centered financial services and advocate for the modernization of financial regulation to support inclusion and responsible innovation.
sponsored sponsored content
amazon web services
Enterprise

AWS CEO: The cloud isn’t just about technology

As AWS preps for its annual re:Invent conference, Adam Selipsky talks product strategy, support for hybrid environments, and the value of the cloud in uncertain economic times.

Photo: Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services

AWS is gearing up for re:Invent, its annual cloud computing conference where announcements this year are expected to focus on its end-to-end data strategy and delivering new industry-specific services.

It will be the second re:Invent with CEO Adam Selipsky as leader of the industry’s largest cloud provider after his return last year to AWS from data visualization company Tableau Software.

Keep Reading Show less
Donna Goodison

Donna Goodison (@dgoodison) is Protocol's senior reporter focusing on enterprise infrastructure technology, from the 'Big 3' cloud computing providers to data centers. She previously covered the public cloud at CRN after 15 years as a business reporter for the Boston Herald. Based in Massachusetts, she also has worked as a Boston Globe freelancer, business reporter at the Boston Business Journal and real estate reporter at Banker & Tradesman after toiling at weekly newspapers.

aws amazon web services cloud computing analytics data analytics adam selipsky

Farewell from Protocol

Image: Protocol

We launched Protocol in February 2020 to cover the evolving power center of tech. It is with deep sadness that just under three years later, we are winding down the publication.

As of today, we will not publish any more stories. All of our newsletters, apart from our flagship, Source Code, will no longer be sent. Source Code will be published and sent for the next few weeks, but it will also close down in December.

Keep Reading Show less
Bennett Richardson

Bennett Richardson ( @bennettrich) is the president of Protocol. Prior to joining Protocol in 2019, Bennett was executive director of global strategic partnerships at POLITICO, where he led strategic growth efforts including POLITICO's European expansion in Brussels and POLITICO's creative agency POLITICO Focus during his six years with the company. Prior to POLITICO, Bennett was co-founder and CMO of Hinge, the mobile dating company recently acquired by Match Group. Bennett began his career in digital and social brand marketing working with major brands across tech, energy, and health care at leading marketing and communications agencies including Edelman and GMMB. Bennett is originally from Portland, Maine, and received his bachelor's degree from Colgate University.

machine learning
Enterprise

Why large enterprises struggle to find suitable platforms for MLops

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, and as larger enterprises go from deploying hundreds of models to thousands and even millions of models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

Photo: artpartner-images via Getty Images

On any given day, Lily AI runs hundreds of machine learning models using computer vision and natural language processing that are customized for its retail and ecommerce clients to make website product recommendations, forecast demand, and plan merchandising. But this spring when the company was in the market for a machine learning operations platform to manage its expanding model roster, it wasn’t easy to find a suitable off-the-shelf system that could handle such a large number of models in deployment while also meeting other criteria.

Some MLops platforms are not well-suited for maintaining even more than 10 machine learning models when it comes to keeping track of data, navigating their user interfaces, or reporting capabilities, Matthew Nokleby, machine learning manager for Lily AI’s product intelligence team, told Protocol earlier this year. “The duct tape starts to show,” he said.

Keep Reading Show less
Kate Kaye

Kate Kaye is an award-winning multimedia reporter digging deep and telling print, digital and audio stories. She covers AI and data for Protocol. Her reporting on AI and tech ethics issues has been published in OneZero, Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CityLab, Ad Age and Digiday and heard on NPR. Kate is the creator of RedTailMedia.org and is the author of "Campaign '08: A Turning Point for Digital Media," a book about how the 2008 presidential campaigns used digital media and data.

mlops ai machine learning
Latest Stories
Bulletins